Thursday, April 11, 2013

J - Jezebels and Gigolos

Admit it: everyone loves a good slut. Don’t deny it. It’s
okay. You’re allowed to like them. Sure, there’s a stigma attached, there’s no
doubt to that. But, somewhere deep down, there’s a little spark in all of us
when a guy or gal is clearly a slut.

Yeah, I don’t have much in the way of social compunction.
It’s why they don’t let me out of the writer pod very often.

But, when we get to sci-fi, suddenly sluts are much more
interesting, even more acceptable. Why is that? Well…I do have a bit of a
theory. But I bet you knew that, didn’t you?

You see, in sci-fi, at least most of the time, there’s
either this hope for a more ideal society or a completely collapsed society.
Either way, sexuality is much less repressed. In the idealized society, people
aren’t so uptight, so sexuality is freed up. So what if you want to sleep
around, or get paid for sex? We’re too busy being happy with our good society!
But, in seriousness, people want sexuality to be freed up. Maybe not
everyone, and maybe not consciously, but it’s, I think, a pretty universal
desire.

Or, say that society has fallen. We don’t have electricity,
we don’t really have much of anything other than basics, if we even have that.
What’s left? Sex. Who’s getting all the luxury money? Prostitutes. So that,
too, becomes acceptable.

That’s why I think sexually free characters work so well in
sci-fi. Personally. Any thoughts?